Quotes About Television

Nothing's changed from when I'm seven years old to now. Nothing's changed at all. I like the same stuff that I did - Kiss, Van Halen, 'Happy Days,' 'Laverne & Shirley,' 'The Brady Bunch,' monsters and all that stuff.

I lived in Vancouver, where they film so many things. So it gave me a good shot at it.

I have got up at truly deplorable hours in the morning to confront Vancouver's Jack Webster on television because I have been told that is the place to get exposure for ideas.

It's not unknown that Vancouver is a huge destination for television and film. It has been for many years. It just seems to be that I'm drawn to the show that shoots in Vancouver.

TV has made everyone so vanilla it's nearly impossible to tell one anchor apart from another.

I think there's a huge amount of magic on television, which is slightly vapid: there's no real meaning or message behind it; it is simply a trick.

Pilot season in L.A. is just this blood bath. They make so many pilots, and such a small percentage are picked up. And then if you are picked up, there are so many variables. You have to get a good time slot, and you have to get promoted. And then you have to thrive in that time slot.

I worked in television; I'm the Failed Pilot Queen, I've done so many television shows, pilots, theater ... when you do it for so long, I'm telling you, you get to the point where it becomes varied because you take what's available for a number of reasons. It's just an occupational hazard.

Harvard's Kennedy School of Government asked me to serve as a fellow at its Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics, and Public Policy. After my varied and celebrated career in television, movies, publishing, and the lucrative world of corporate speaking, being a fellow at Harvard seemed, frankly, like a step down.

People are used to watching cop shows in which the cops are very straight down the line and they solve the crimes, but I think people actually have a much more sophisticated and varied view of the police.

I had it in my contract with CBS, a very weird clause that was never written before and certainly not since, that if I wanted to do a variety show within the first five years of the contract, CBS would have to put it on for 30 shows.

For better or worse, in the 21st century, reality shows are the variety show.

I never wanted to do reunion shows for the sake of a reunion show. I've done all the 'Brady Bunch' stuff except for the Variety Show, but when a talk show wants us all to get together for their sake, it's not interesting to me.

When we first did 'Big Night Out,' there was no chance of someone doing a little show in a pub then being on telly. There was a little Oxbridge route in and an old-fashioned variety route.

I directed an episode of Touched by an Angel a couple of months ago, and I will be doing more of that. I just like to keep a bit of variety going; it keeps things interesting.

'Dancing With the Stars' has become a phenomenon, and when I look at that type of reality show, it's like a variety show.

My father was invited to play on a television show when I was 17 or 18 that was an early equivalent of educational television, a Sunday afternoon kind of variety art show.

Making music on TV used to be as common as commercials. In the '60s and '70s, prime time was stuffed with variety shows headlined by such major and treasured talents as Carol Burnett, Red Skelton, the Smothers Brothers and Richard Pryor, who had a very brief comedy-variety hour on NBC that was censored literally to death.

There was a little afternoon show that was called Afternoon. Back in those days in television, most local stations had a midday show for housewives that had a series of things. It was like a variety show for midday.

Television is where the best work for women is right now. I would love to do more movies, but the reality is women have many more opportunities on television to play a greater variety of characters.

I think what my hope is is that the only downside of having a steady job on television is, I think for all actors, there's a piece, there's some adrenaline, and part of the love of the job is not knowing what's coming next, and the variety.

Some people hate the sight of me as soon as they see me on television. They loathe the look of me, and I accept that from the days of variety. I would walk on and some people would open a newspaper and think, 'He's first on, so he can't be any good.' I accept that.

Well, I loved variety in television, I loved sketch comedy. At 'Saturday Night Live,' I stayed almost seven years.

Obviously neither 'American Idol' nor 'Dancing With the Stars' is a variety show in the classic sense, but the way they incorporate elements of drama, comedy and suspense is moderately ingenious.